Cop to Corpse

by Peter Lovesey

  He opened a window to let in some reviving air.

  He could be certain John Leaman was awake. The call to his mobile had found the reliable DI already in Westwood. If their estimate of the sniper’s intention was right, there wouldn’t be anything happening for some hours yet, but the men had to be strategically posted and the village streets checked for parked vehicles, especially motorcycles. Leaman was seeing to this. There could be no better choice for the job. He was a biker himself and bored everyone rigid with his talk of Suzuki Bandits.

  A winding minor road brought Diamond on a steep descent through the village of Freshford, a place he regarded with some respect, and not only for its well-stocked inn. In 1974 when North Somerset was redesignated as Avon, the defiant inhabitants held a mock funeral in protest.

  Passing through that hotbed of insurrection, he crossed the sixteenth century bridge over the Frome and his headlights picked out a rare stretch of level road, the floor of the Limpley Stoke valley. This didn’t last long. He was soon climbing Staples Hill and entering another county. Wiltshire was outside his jurisdiction.

  But he hadn’t been expecting a border control.

  Lights. Cones. A figure in a reflective jacket waved him down.

  He lowered the window. ‘What’s up?’

  The young police officer had to be a Wiltshire man. Not a glimmer of recognition. ‘Do you mind telling me where you’re going, sir?’

  ‘No, but I’ll tell you who I am.’ Diamond brandished his warrant card. ‘Is there a lion on the loose?’

  There was no answer.

  ‘Why are you stopping the traffic?’

  A sharp change of tone. ‘Sorry, sir. Orders, sir.’

  ‘Who from?’

  ‘DI Polehampton, sir, Serial Crimes Unit.’

  Polehampton. The blood pressure rocketed. What was the point of a stakeout if everyone coming into the area was alerted?

  ‘You can stop this nonsense right now, clear the road and get out of sight, do you understand? Those are my orders. Do it.’

  Chuntering, gripping the wheel, Diamond almost missed the narrow lane leading to the village.

  Westwood is large enough to be divided into Upper and Lower. The part he had reached, on the edge of the ridge above the Avon valley, was the Upper. He drove past a mix of cottages and modern houses to a clearing where upwards of thirty uniformed police had gathered. These were Avon and Somerset men he recognised. John Leaman was among them.

  How ridiculous.

  At boiling point by now, Diamond flung open the door, put his crutch to the ground and emerged with a limp almost as menacing as Anthony Sher playing Richard III.

  He had their complete attention.

  ‘This is supposed to be an undercover operation,’ he said. ‘What are you doing here?’

  Leaman cleared his throat. ‘Guv, this is me, John Leaman.’

  ‘I can see who you are. In fact, I can see all of you. I could see the checkered caps from two hundred yards off in the moonlight.’ To be truthful he’d seen them in his headlamps, but the point was the same. ‘We’re supposed to be staging an ambush, not a passing-out parade. I suggest you remove them now.’

  They did so.

  Leaman said, ‘I’m responsible, guv. I picked this as the quietest place to meet.’

  They had to assemble somewhere to get orders, even Diamond had to concede, and this was away from most of the houses, with only a farmyard across the street. He asked Leaman for a progress report. All the streets in Upper and Lower Westwood had been checked for parked vehicles. Registration numbers had been noted. Four motorcycles had been located, three in the lower part of the village. Leaman reeled off the makes and details. All were registered to local residents and were now under surveillance.

  ‘Was this done without waking half the village?’ he asked. ‘We don’t want an audience tonight.’

  ‘Those were their orders, guv.’

  ‘Get them dispersed, then, and out of sight. Do they know what to do? No heroics. Leave that to the armed officers. Simply observe and report. I don’t want to see another bobby until the sniper is dead or disarmed.’

  ‘They’ve all been told.’

  Actually Leaman had done a good job. The hat-bands could be forgiven. The men moved off in different directions.

  ‘Where’s Polehampton?’ Diamond asked, switching his anger to the main offender.

  ‘With Jack Gull, I believe. They went to the woods to liaise with the Wiltshire team.’

  ‘Did you know he ordered a stop on vehicles approaching Westwood?’

  Leaman put his hand to his head. ‘He said something about surveillance.’

  ‘Since when was surveillance Mr. Plod with a torch in the middle of the road? I’m wondering if he’s sealed off all the other approaches. Can you reach him on your radio?’

  All Leaman got was static.

  ‘Try Jack Gull, then.’

  Supergull’s abrasive voice came on the line. ‘That you, Diamond, on the fucking scene at last?’

  ‘Yes, but no thanks to your deputy,’ Diamond said, and told him about the road block. ‘If he’s sealed off the village, we’re all wasting our time here.’

  ‘Sounds like a slight balls-up. Hold on.’

  Good as it would have been to hear the exchange between Gull and Polehampton, Diamond had to imagine it.

  Finally Gull came back on line. ‘No problem. All the stops have now been called off. A temporary measure to make sure we bussed all our men in without being overlooked. We’ve staked out the woods down here. No chance anyone can come or go without being observed. That’s if you and your men have control of the fucking village.’

  ‘Control is a strong word. We’re in place,’ Diamond said.

  ‘Where are you going to be?’

  ‘Me personally? Free range.’ He winked at John Leaman.

  ‘Keep in touch, then.’

  ‘Until I ask for radio silence,’ Diamond said, begging the question who was running this. ‘That’ll be necessary later.’ He switched off. No ‘over and out’ in case Gull wanted the last word.

  He was starting to feel restored. Next, he wanted a look at the parked motorcycles. ‘Are they far off?’

  ‘Too far for you to walk,’ Leaman said.

  ‘Hop in the car, then.’

  Guided by Leaman, he drove down to Lower Westwood. The two levels of the village had once been separated by fields, Leaman told him, but during World War II a small business called Royal Enfield manufacturing — of all things — motorcycles had been acquired for secret war work and almost a hundred extra bungalows were built for workers drafted in from the Midlands. More infill had taken place since and Upper and Lower were defined only by the two through roads north and south.

  They toured the small streets in Diamond’s car. He decided the chance of the sniper owning any of the three bikes parked in Lower Westwood was small. It would be too much of a trek from Becky Addy Wood.

  ‘Do you think he’s in the area already?’ Leaman asked.

  ‘Could be, if he got in before Polehampton closed it down. My sense is that he’ll come early. He’ll want to do a recce before entering the wood.’

  ‘But you don’t think he’ll park the bike at this end?’

  ‘Unlikely. Now that I’ve seen the set-up, John, Upper Westwood definitely gives him the most options.’

  ‘He could be using a car this time.’

  Diamond gazed at the long line of parked cars in a street called The Pastures. ‘Thanks for that. Cheers me up no end.’

  ‘A car would be less obvious, when we all know he used the bike before.’

  ‘I get the point. You don’t have to hammer it home.’

  ‘Let’s hope Jack Gull nabs him in the wood, eh?’

  ‘We can hope. How many men does Gull have?’

  ‘Fifty or more, plus the armed response team. They’re covering all the routes in.’

  ‘All the obvious routes in. I still think Westwood is the most likel
y.’

  ‘I don’t want to be pessimistic,’ Leaman said, ‘but this is a guy who surprised us once already.’

  ‘One thing is certain. He knows the wood.’

  ‘And you still think he’ll come for the gun?’

  ‘I do. It’s a balance of risks. In another full day of searching we’d probably find it. Forensics would extract enough information from that gun to lead us straight to him. He has to recover it fast, so he’ll take his chance tonight.’

  They returned to Upper Westwood and Leaman showed him the fourth bike, a black Yamaha, parked off the road in a lane between two stone walls.

  ‘This is the best bet yet,’ Diamond said, trying to visualise the bike that had run him down. ‘Have you checked the registered owner?’ The Police National Computer came in useful sometimes, even he would admit.

  ‘Someone called Jones.’

  ‘Has it been used in the last hour?’

  Leaman got out and put his hand tentatively close to the exhaust pipes. He shook his head.

  ‘We need a man observing.’

  On cue, a constable bobbed his head above a drystone wall. He’d been crouching in somebody’s garden.

  Diamond grinned. ‘Magic. But don’t do that if the sniper comes for the bike. He’ll blow your brains out.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be. Down again, lad.’

  They parked the car in Chestnut Grove, a side street of bungalows. A cloud passed in front of the moon and darkness took over. ‘What do you make the time?’ he asked Leaman.

  ‘Just after one-fifteen.’

  ‘Hours yet. Where are you posting yourself?’

  ‘Opposite where you first saw us, near Upper Farm. There’s a place that gives some cover.’

  ‘I didn’t notice.’ He grinned. ‘No bad thing.’

  ‘It’s the way down to the stone quarry.’

  ‘Where we were in the wood today?’

  ‘Not the open cast bit. The underground workings.’

  Diamond’s insides clenched. He should have remembered Westwood was well known for its stone mine.

  ‘It’s huge, I was told,’ Leaman said, heaping on the embarrassment without realising how personally Diamond was taking it. ‘It stretches right under where we’re standing and a long way beyond.’

  ‘I know.’

  But he was unstoppable now he’d started. ‘The war work I told you about was done in the mine. The employees were on twelve-hour shifts and never saw daylight for days on end in the winter months. The government installed a room for sun-ray treatment so they could get their vitamin D.’

  Diamond wasn’t listening.

  ‘Or is it E?’

  No response.

  ‘I don’t think you heard a word I was saying,’ Leaman said in an injured tone.

  ‘I did. You’re on about the mine.’

  Only a couple of years ago Diamond had pursued a suspect through the disused underground quarry at Combe Down. The workings had been a honeycomb. Leaman knew about this and still didn’t seem to appreciate the potential a mine had as a secret means of approach and escape.

  Diamond said, more to himself than Leaman, ‘Why didn’t we notice this on the map in the incident room?’

  ‘Because maps only show you what’s on the surface.’

  True. Prosaically, maddeningly true.

  ‘Is it secure?’

  ‘Metal doors, padlocks. You wouldn’t get in without a crowbar.’

  ‘I want to be sure of that. Come on.’

  Leaman raked a hand through his hair. ‘Do you really want to go there, guv? It’s steep.’

  ‘Show me now.’

  Leaman produced a small hand torch. ‘The mine is one of the last still in use as an underground stone quarry,’ he said, keeping up his tour-guide mode in a too obvious try to cover the unease between them. ‘They dig out huge blocks and leave them to dry out for a while, so they’re firmer. Then they load them onto flatbed trucks.’

  Diamond was silent.

  The going down wasn’t so bad as all that for a limping man. Only the ramp down to the entrance was tricky.

  Several of the massive limestone blocks were stacked nearby, pallid in the moonlight, each stencilled with a number. Diamond asked for the torch and made a close inspection of the doors and satisfied himself that they were, after all, secured with strong metal fastenings. Nothing had been forced as far as he could tell.

  ‘Looks solid enough.’

  ‘It needed to be,’ Leaman said. ‘They hid the Crown Jewels here during the war.’

  ‘Pull the other one, John.’

  ‘It’s true. The mine had to be air-conditioned and kept at a special temperature. It’s amazing what was stored here, all crated up, of course. They built a narrow-gauge railway underground to transport the stuff. The Elgin Marbles, the statue of Charles I and the Banqueting Hall ceiling from Whitehall, the bronze screen from the Henry VII Chapel in Westminster Abbey.’

  The level of detail was persuasive, but Diamond remained sceptical. ‘Who told you this?’

  ‘One of the Wiltshire sergeants who knows the village. He’ll be hunkered down in Becky Addy Wood by now. He said the local police helped to guard the place. The British Museum supplied most of the security and our people had to help at night.’

  ‘I thought they used the London tube to store the treasures.’

  ‘They did until 1942. Then they decided it was safer to move them here. Twenty-five thousand square feet of storage, all secured with strong-room doors brought from Bloomsbury.’

  ‘I’m starting to believe this — as if it matters now.’ Diamond stepped back from the main door to the mine.

  ‘All right, then?’ Leaman asked.

  Plainly it wasn’t. ‘All these mines have ventilation shafts,’ Diamond said. ‘I’d like to know where they come out.’

  ‘We’d have to ask the locals.’

  He checked the time again. Approaching 2 A.M.

  ‘I’d better get a move on. If I head down the track, I come to the quarry first and then the wood, right?’

  ‘I don’t advise it, guv. It’s bloody dangerous. If you don’t fall over and break the other leg you’ll get shot by the firearms team, like as not.’

  ‘Radio ahead and tell them I’m on my way.’

  ‘I can’t come with you,’ Leaman said. ‘The men expect to find me here.’

  ‘I don’t need a bloody attendant, John.’

  He didn’t tell Leaman he was confident of this end of the operation. Gull was the weak point.

  Without more argument he started picking his way down the escarpment, gripping the crutch with one hand, the torch with the other. Necessarily slow, he was unlikely to trip, he told himself. The moon was fully visible again, allowing him to choose the best footing. He heard from behind him the faint sound of Leaman making contact on his personal radio, occasional snatches of words raised in emphasis: ‘insisted … couldn’t possibly … with a crutch, yes … I should think in the next three-quarters of an hour.’

  Sooner than that if I’m any judge, Diamond thought. He was moving better than he expected. The going was easier down the slope than over flat ground, and when his injured leg made contact it didn’t feel as painful as earlier in the day. Severe bruising, probably, and nothing worse. His self-diagnosis in the X-ray department was paying off. He’d saved the National Health Service some funds and saved himself from a dose of radiation.

  A voice of reason broke in and told him he was a raving idiot to be doing this alone. If the sniper was about and wanted another kill, he couldn’t have an easier target. And if the sniper didn’t get him, some trigger-happy firearms officer would.

  Friendly fire, they termed it. A classic oxymoron, and not a good way to go.

  Better not stop for a rest.

  He picked up a little speed instead. Ahead he could see the road down to Avoncliff and the dark patch that was Becky Addy. This was where the search teams had been unloaded yesterday
(it was safe to call it yesterday now — and, hell’s bells, it felt like two days ago instead of less than twenty-four hours). Back then, the minibuses had parked beside the road. Tonight they must have delivered the men and moved off to some place less conspicuous. Give Jack Gull some credit. He’d got this right.

  Even so, the sniper would be expecting a trap.

  Increasingly, the crutch was striking chunks of stone half-buried in the ground, an indication that he was close to the site of the old quarry.

  He stopped.

  From the thicket to his right came the snap of a twig, a sharp, strong sound that could only have been made by foot pressure.

  He flung himself face down and lay still. He was on open ground in clear moonlight, an easy target. Go on, you bastard. Pull the trigger and let me have it. You can kill me, but the others will know you’re here.

  Another sound came from the same bush, the crunch of dead leaves, too forceful to have been caused by the wind.

  Only fifteen to twenty yards off.

  His heart pounded his ribs.

  He pictured the sniper taking aim, prone, propped on elbows to secure the gun. Professional pride dictated that the bullet should enter the temple just above the ear. A clean kill.

  I can deny you that, matey. He brought up his arm and wrapped it around his head. The shot would still penetrate his arm and smash into his skull, but clean it would not be.

  Still more delay. Seemed he’d bought a little time. He tilted his head a fraction for a sight of the bushes where the sounds were coming from.

  Something moved low to the ground.

  A silvery figure shuffled towards him in the moonlight, smaller than he expected, and — surprisingly — with a black and white muzzle.

  A badger.

  Suddenly the animal sensed where Diamond was and veered off left. The last he saw of it was the sway of the rump disappearing into a hole in the ground.

  He might have laughed if he hadn’t had the shakes. The sense of imminent death had not been funny. He waited a couple more minutes to get a grip on his nerves, then hauled himself to his feet and hobbled on. He wouldn’t be telling anyone about the experience except, perhaps, Paloma after a few drinks.